Denpasar to Darwin with Merpati Nusantara Airlines

 

Image by Ardhana S

Merpati Nusantara Airlines were a regional Indonesian airline that used to fly between Bali, Timor and Darwin. And they were cheap. They ceased trading in 2014.

Back in the 70s it was still perfectly normal to smoke on a plane – albeit it had to be down the back! However, it wasn’t so normal was to smoke a join on a plane. 2001: A Space Odyssey had been released in the late 60;’s and was still on my must see list. I was rapt to discover that I could watch it on my flight from Denpasar to Kupang.

So there I was happily winging my way home watching one of the classic movies of the time  when I feel a tap on my shoulder. The very nice man in the seat behind me wanted to know if I’d like to share a joint. I was quite shocked but not too shocked to say no!  So after that I was even more happily winging my way home while watching A Space Odyssey. The joint was the perfect accompaniment to the soundtrack.

We landed in Kupang without further incident. This was to be a quick stop to pick up any extra passengers for the next leg to Darwin. However, a couple of things happened to delay that next leg. Firstly, the skies opened to release a typical tropical downpour complete with thunder storm. Secondly, some guy had bought a lamp that had a solid silver ball attached and was being grilled about its contents. They suspected drugs of course, but no matter how often he insisted that it was empty the Kupang customs folks were not going to let him take it on the plane until they could break open that silver ball. That proved impossible, but the argy-bargy back and forth went on for ages. We should have been back on the plane by now and being served lunch. Perhaps because we were stoned this fellow traveller and I decided that our lunches were probably on the plane and we calmly walked out of the terminal across the tarmac and on to our plane. And sure enough there was a trolley full of sandwiches and other treats for Kupang to Darwin passengers. We had just retrieved a tray each and were about to tuck into lunch when one of the airline staff caught us in the act and ordered us back to the terminal!

Customs staff were still wrangling with the passenger with the silver ball and the weather had become so bad it was declared unsafe to fly. So we were all to be put up in Kupang for the night. I don’t know where it was we stayed. It didn’t really feel like a hotel but we were pleased to see a dining room that was set for a large group pf people – at least we would befed. As it turned out dinner was nothing more than bread and butter – that’s all a very unprepared Kupang could muster. 

CC image courtesy of Jacques Beaulieu

Before I went to sleep I went for a walk and remember feeling like I had entered another world. It was as quiet as anywhere I'd ever been. I stood on a bushy headland looking at the sea and listened to the sounds of unseen distant voices, birds, sea and wind and felt a great peace.

As we boarded the plane for Darwin next morning I bumped into Lizzie – my brother’s kind of girlfriend at the time. She had just got off the plane from Darwin and was heading to Bali to meet up with him. We flew on that same plane back to Darwin. This time it was my turn to be thoroughly grilled about what I been doing in Bali - drugs, marihuana etc. It was all quite pleasant and I was quite open and honest with the customs guy asking all the questions. I quite enjoyed the interaction in fact. Later that night I was fossicking around in my shoulder bag – which the customs guy had thoroughly searched - and out fell a nice juicy head of cannabis. My heart skipped a beat before I smiled and I realised that I had been very lucky, and that this story could have had a very different ending!

En Route to Bali 1973 - Train Across Java

 

CC image courtesy Nikita Gavrilovs 

The train trip across Java from Jakarta to Surabaya   was incredibly hot and crowded with people. Even   though we all had seats people sat on the armrests,   stood in the aisles, sat or laid down in the aisles or   even somehow managed to lie up in the baggage   racks. There were people everywhere. Thankfully all   the train windows were left open so at least the flow   of air against your perspiring skin offered some   semblance of cooling.

We'd been warned before we started the journey that we wouldn't be able to buy any of the cold drinks that were served on route because they were probably not hygienic. We were to drink just hot tea or coffee or bottled soft drinks like Coca Cola which were never cold. However, at regular intervals people who made a living from selling food and drink on the train would come through the carriages with these trays of beautifully coloured cold drinks that had ice cubes in them and were clearly deliciously cold. Local passengers snapped up these drinks - they were dirt cheap – and guzzled them down while we just sort of sat there drooling with envy for the first several hours of the journey and stayed with the coffee, tea and Coca Cola routine. As the hours went by this became harder and harder and at one point one of our group decided they couldn't take it anymore. These drinks looked so inviting! Suddenly as one of these vendors with these enticing looking drinks came by he just blurted out ‘I'll have one of those’,  took it, drank it and we all watched in anticipation to see whether he would get sick on the spot or 5 minutes later but after a certain amount of time passed he still seemed to be fine so from then on we all helped ourselves to these drinks and no one got sick. Not on the train at least.

It was a 24 hour journey so we had to endure at least one night on the train. It was around Christmas time and in those days I always carried my guitar with me.  I don't know how it came about. I guess I must have played a few songs.  I don't remember whether it was my idea or whether someone asked me to play my guitar but late at night as the train was going clickety clack clickety clack through the warm tropical night across Java I played Silent Night.  It was one of the more remarkable things that had ever happened to me. Silent Night is one of those songs that everybody knows it seems almost everywhere and even if they don't the melody is so poignant and engaging and beautiful that it stops everything and it did indeed stop everything on the train that night.  For a few minutes as I was playing and singing Silent Night I was aware that 50 - 80 people or more were dead silent and were just listening to me singing and playing. Nineteen year old Michael on a train in Java singing Silent Night in the middle of a tropical night! Those who knew the melody or the words joined in.  It was a really special moment.

There is another indelible memory of this train journey across Java. As all the Indonesian people often walked up and down the train so we took to doing the same thing. It would help pass the time, stretch your legs, and you’d get some fresh air because the area between the carriages was not covered. It was just a very basic coupling joining one carriage to the next. There was a metal plate you could walk on with a couple of flimsy hose handles that would be considered unsafe and completely forbidden in Australia.  But in Indonesia back then it was allowed. It was nice and breezy there and a lot of people gathered at these intersections between the carriages.  The end of each carriage also had a ladder that allowed you to climb up on the roof and invariably there were people on those ladders between the carriages and clearly there were people going up onto the roof. Eventually I got my turn to climb up one of these ladders and to my amazement the carriage that I was riding on had about 20 people up there sitting, talking, some walking, some lying … most of the carriages had several people up there so not only were people in the aisles and on the seats and in the baggage racks they were on the roof as well! I stayed up there for a while and really enjoyed it. However some time later there was a bridge in the distance. Clearly it made sense to get off the roof while the train goes under the bridge and most people did. They climbed down from the roof. As I was climbing down the ladder between the carriages I decided to stay there and keep my head just above the roof level of the carriage to see what it was like as the train whooshed under the bridge.  There was a little boy - I'm guessing about 8 - 10 years old - who hadn't moved and was still sitting quite erect and cross legged on the top of the train and I was concerned because the bridge was coming closer and this little boy hadn't moved and I was trying to get the attention of other people to tell them the bridge was coming and that there was a boy still up there on the roof. They were clearly not worried and told me not to fuss.  As the train passed underneath the bridge I kept an eye above the level of the carriage to watch what this boy was doing - actually I don't think I did. I looked away right at the last minute. But without flinching he just sat there as the train whizzed under the bridge cool as a cucumber. It didn't decapitate him! In fact he was completely unhurt and the people around me laughed because they trusted that this boy knew what he was doing. One of them actually pointed to him and said “been before.” The boy was quite familiar with the train ride and the height of the bridge. He was just enjoying a game of chicken with the bridge. I'll never forget it

En Route to Bali 1973 - Singapore/Jakarta

 

In 1973 Singapore didn’t allow people with long hair to enter. So my brother Damien and I were ceremoniously sheared among friends in Perth before our departure on an A.U.S. flight. AUS stood for Australian Union of Students and everyone on board was a student enjoying cheap student fares so you can imagine the party like atmosphere .

I passed the haircut inspection after having to turn a full 360 degrees twice to allow the customs officer to closely inspect my hair, but lingered to see how one of the more senior passengers (he was probably all of 30) with very long hair would get through. He had tucked all his hair up under a hat. He was asked to remove his hat and at that point he immediately started demanding in a very loud voice that he would like to speak to someone from the Australian embassy. He just kept repeating this over and over and eventually he was allowed to enter Singapore with no haircut!

This was my first visit to Asia. I was 19. Singapore had not yet gone through its economic boom time and the streets between Changi airport and the city were lined with poverty. People dressed in rags living by the side of the road; rickety market stalls lined the route, noisy dirty traffic flew past without any apparent order. It’s that assault on the senses that many Asian nations offer first time visitors that nothing can prepare you for. I remember staring open mouthed at the chaos unfolding by the side of the road as we made our way to the hotel.

That aside, the party atmosphere continued on at the student hotel most of us were booked in to. We roamed between various rooms where the alcohol and marijuana was flowing. One of the rooms belonged to the senior hippy guy who had bluffed his way through customs and who was now sitting on his bed naked and cross-legged rolling joints like an Indian holy man. There was a sudden moment of panic when we get a call to one of the rooms that the authorities were coming up to investigate. People scattered back to their own rooms and all the marijuana was quickly flushed down toilets, and windows opened to allow the smoke out.  Smoking and possession of marijuana in Singapore in those days was even more serious than having long hair! It turned out to be a prank - one of the students had just decided to freak everyone out with the fake phone call. It worked. It killed the mood completely.

Damien and I were planning to head to Bali in Indonesia. This involved flying to Jakarta to catch the train through Java and then a ferry to Bali. The flight to Jakarta was not a student flight. I was seated next to a seasoned traveller who had been to Jakarta many times and wasn’t impressed that his work had brought him back there. He called it a hell hole and said that if I thought Singapore was bad I hadn’t seen anything yet. How right he was. There are moments in your travelling life that you never forget. My first steps outside Jakarta airport was one such moment. It was absolute mayhem. A mass of people and traffic and noise in a chaos impossible to comprehend. As we stood trying to work out how to get a bemo (taxi) I noticed a man lying in the gutter – barely clothed and quite still. He could easily have been dead. And the traffic flooded past just inches from his head. No one appeared to notice. Or care. The opening lyrics to a Neil Young song played in my head: “old man lying by the side of the road…. don’t let it bring you down…. it’s only castles burning….”

By the time we reached our accommodation for the night all the women in the bemo were crying at what we’d seen. They guys I guess were crying on the inside. I know I was. Jakarta was extreme culture shock. I think we spent a couple of days there. It’s all a bit of a blur. It taught me so much in such a short time. I have never felt the desire to return.

Our next adventure was the train across Java en route to the island paradise of Bali.

Song #71 New Times

NEW TIMES

(Listen)

CHORUS

Well my son’s away – our thoughts and prayers go with you
Travel far and safe – our love goes always with you

As you follow your dreams – remember those at home go with you
Though you’re far away we travel in silence with you
Hoping you’ll find what you’re seeking

There’ll be brand new faces – who will want to know you
Brand new places and some will no doubt test you
But I know you’ll find your way through

CHORUS

I have watched you change – from baby to grown man
I love who you’ve become – a man who knows that children
Can teach us lots of life’s lessons

And no matter how long – you roam the world afar
There are people at home – who you can always turn to
If it all seems too hard

CHORUS

BRIDGE

I wandered abroad to discover new seas
We took you away from this land that you now leave
So I well understand what now takes you away
And wonder alone what your new world will bring
And if this land.....will be home again

CHORUS

(Copyright M Coghlan 2012)

Commentary: a goodbye song I wrote for my son who had just headed off to live in Europe.

Song #26 The Ugly Australian

 

I wrote this song after a deck class passage on a Greek ferry between Greece and Haifa. Deck class was cheap and basic – you slept outside on deck but a meal was included. I complained about the dreadful meal (don’t remember what it was) but to placate me they put in the first class lounge. I sat there alone for quite some time before I was served a meal that wasn’t that much better.

Decades later I added a verse to highlight the plight of refugees languishing in Australian off-shore detention centres.

 

THE UGLY AUSTRALIAN

(listen HERE)

 

You put shit food down in front of me and expect me to eat it

You put me up in the first class lounge with my anger and expect that to placate it

I’m on a foreign boat in a foreign sea In times foreign to us all

At times like this I'm wonderin' why I’m so far from my native shore

So I’m going home

 

I’m tired of the ever moving round

I’m tired of the ever changing ground

 

Australia will you wait for me with your long and golden shore?

You’re a land of sun and dreams they tell me

But I wanna know for sure so I’m coming home

 

Are you keeping up with fashion? Or are you keeping down the poor?

Are you looking down the barrel? Or has nothing changed at all?  I’m going home.

 

You put shit food down in front of me and expect me to eat it

You stick me out on an offshore island with my pain and expect that to placate it

I’m in a foreign place in a foreign sea in times foreign to us all

Australia was what I was looking for - why I left my native shore

Now I can’t go home

 

I’m tired of the never moving round

I’m tired of the never changing ground

 

Australia I will wait for you with your long and golden shores

You’re a land of sun and dreams they tell me

Will I ever know for sure? I have no home

 

Are we closing up the country? Have we locked up all the doors?

Are those in need no longer welcome? When did we get so mean?

And they can’t go home

They have no home

(1982 and 2020)

 

 

 

 

 

The Role of Culture

In another COVID foray into forgotten drawers and corners, in amongst another pile of papers, a letter written by someone called Joyce tumbled out - a letter written to my Dad. I vaguely remember Mum and Dad having a friend called Joyce but I never met her.

In this letter to Dad Joyce had written, "thank you so much for sharing your son's memoir with us. I would now very much like to meet this 'cultural chameleon' son of yours."

I was a little bamboozled by this.  I knew I had written a memoir for a university assignment some decades back, but I have no memory of giving it to my parents to read.

Anyway, I eventually found a copy of it on an old floppy disc. It’s kind of like the story of the first part of my life through the lens of culture. I've put it up on the web and amongst other things it offers a great explanation of why I like to travel so much.

I wrote it in 1991 so an upgrade is needed that includes the last three decades.

My professor at the time was one Jerzy Smolicz, a Polish- born sociologist and educationalist acknowledged widely as a major contributor to cultural understanding in Australia. He really liked this memoir and I’m proud of what he wrote:

Michael – I was pleased to read your long and illuminating essay – and I can see that you are only halfway there! Portugal still to describe; Ireland still to visit. I think that you have described very sensitively the array and variety of cultures that have influenced you – while you continue to maintain a strong Australian identity, but of the kind which permits you to adjust your personal cultural system through interaction. A very perceptive memoir.

The memoir is OVER HERE ;)